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Three years after he kicks Colin Provolone’s dagger across the floor, Delissandro Katzon writes him a letter.
Colin,
I am writing this unsure if you will ever see it. I do not know your whereabouts and I do not know if I have the courage to admit my shame to anyone but myself.
Every night before I sleep, I remember your face as you left the chamber below the Great Pyramid of Food. I had never seen you so defeated. In my anger I thought you weak, incapable of rising to the challenge set for us regardless of the costs. As the years have passed, I have found success for myself, and yet my hubris has proven me wrong. My own mother has turned away from me and went to live out her days as an Outlander, and in turn I have become Chief. When I watched my mother walk away over the horizon as the Bulb rose, I saw your face again in hers. The same expression.
I still do not know how history will remember me. I know I have been a prolific warrior and advisor to Warlord Basha in my time, but there are no promises. I have made gambles to secure a united Meatlands and while I achieved my aim, I wonder if I have not been too reckless. I wonder if my stubbornness has made me too hard and I again think of you. By now I am sure you heard the news that Princess Sapphria of Candia was murdered in Carn on a diplomatic visit. Her death sparked the civil war that has resulted in the Meatlands as it stands today, but I must confess to you that I orchestrated her assassination. The very moment I received confirmation of her death I realized precisely what I have done in the name of victory, and I knew you would have inevitably left my side.
You told me your secret was best kept safe because it would make our relationship simpler and when you finally told me, I had closed off my heart out of pride. It has taken me every day of these years to understand precisely why you left me there. I now know in that moment and at the moment of Sapphria’s death, I was the very thing that has haunted your life—a prideful man who valued his ambitions above all else and left others to the dust. You believed that your secret would complicate our relationship and it has provided me both clarity and great shame, so I must admit you were right. I cannot say in truth that I regret my actions completely, but I regret allowing you to leave with every fiber of my body.
I suppose now it is appropriate to finally apologize. Colin, I have allowed my youth and my own political motives to cloud my judgment. I do not know if you can forgive me. I do not expect you to, if you ever read this. Some part of me is considering throwing this letter directly into the fire the very minute I finish, but I know I need to say it in some form— I am deeply, deeply sorry, Colin. I am sorry every time I wake up without you. I am sorry every time I recall the horrible feeling of Pamelia’s blood on my face, and how the light vanished from your eyes as you watched it happen. I am sorry every time I look at your dagger. I am not truly alone here, Karna is with me and her companionship is invaluable. She has grown into a woman of wisdom and skill, and I do not say this to degrade her, but there is only one Skald to the Chief of the Beef Clan in my heart and his name is Colin Provolone. Even if you reject the title I wish you would accept the title of friend.
Yours most sincerely,
Delissandro Katzon, Chief of the Beef Clan
Deli, inexplicably, stamps the letter with his full noble insignia and seals it with deep blood red wax. He glances behind him at the crackling fire and stares into it for several minutes, as if looking for an answer to his dilemma. He shoves the sealed letter away in his pocket and at least in the moment, does not send it to the flames.
_
Another five years later, Colin Provolone is standing in a room with Delissandro. They are frozen on opposite walls, a cavernous gap between them. Deli’s face is shocked. Colin’s expression is apprehensive, torn between relief and fear.
“Colin,” Deli breathes.
“That's my name,” Colin says. He shakes his head, ashamed of making a stupid joke in such a crucial moment.
Deli doesn't laugh and he doesn't grimace, either. Slowly, he approaches Colin and stops in the center of the room.
“Are you staying?” he asks.
“What?”
“Please tell me you're not just going to turn around and leave.”
Colin pauses. He's not even completely sure why he's here, but he doesn't think he's leaving. At least not immediately.
“No,” he replies, trying to sound assuring.
“It’s difficult to believe that when your hand is nearly on the doorknob.”
Reflexively Colin crosses his arms over his chest. “It's not.”
Deli scrunches up his face for a second. “Do you need something? Political asylum? Money?”
He's being serious, which surprises Colin.
“No, I, I don't need that. I needed it a lot more when we met.”
Remembrance flickers in Delissandro’s eyes.
“I’m here, I’m here because I wanted to see you,” Colin starts to say. “I needed to know you were okay. I’ve, well, I've been, uh, stamping out the Sanctis Putris all over and I hadn't heard any whispers about you in over a year. My business took me to Carn. So I’m here.”
“Well. I am indeed alive, if that's what you meant,” Delissandro says. “There are no whispers about me because I am no longer a political man. I retired after the war ended. Disappearing at the Battle of Pangranos ruined my reputation.”
“Ah.”
“There are benefits to no longer having a reputation.”
“I wouldn't know. I never really had one.”
Deli laughs sincerely. “Do you believe that?”
“Being a hired bodyguard doesn't count.”
“You know that isn't what I mean. You're Sir Colin Provolone, noble champion of the Bulbian Church—”
“I was. Raphaniel handed me that title so I could travel with him. I renounced it the day after he died.”
“You're also my skald. I wasn't finished.”
Colin flinches a little at the word. “I gave that up too. I don't want titles.”
Deli purses his lips. Colin takes a moment to study him—mustard eyepatch, thick muscled torso, various furs draped around his shoulders and legs, with Ceresian sandals tied around his calves. Colin knows he looks different, older (and uglier by his own admission) but aside from new scars Deli is still very much himself, at least as Colin recalls him.
“You say you have never had a reputation, but I believe we are in the same position,” Delissandro says finally. “We have abandoned public life for our own aims.”
“Sure, I guess that's true,” Colin says.
Deli suddenly looks flustered.
“But I was, ah, I was preparing to, uh, join my mother.”
Colin, already on edge, jumps to the worst case scenario. “You're going to kill yourself?” he asks, uncrossing his arms and actually taking a few steps toward the other man.
“No, Colin, that's—she’s not—well, in truth I don't know if she is dead, but she left our clan years ago, ashamed of me and my ambition. I intend to become an Outlander like she did.”
“But why?”
“I didn’t want to go back to what I was doing after the battle in Pangranos. I would have stayed with you, had you not left so soon, but instead I came home and tried to make some sense of it all. I had to grieve, I had to give up my title.“
Deli pauses. “I realized we all can become pawns no matter how powerful we think we are, and I was so willing. I was so easily taken away by it, Colin.”
“My own weaknesses and flaws aside, I am a disgrace for abandoning my post. Basha has been very generous to not cast me out personally. I have nothing to stay in Carn for.”
There is an unspoken if you’re not there attached to his last sentence but Colin pretends he can't tell.
“I don't intend to be, uh, I don't want to make anything harder, um, for you,” he mumbles, trailing off. “And I’m sorry for ditching you in Ceresia. If that helps.”
“You said you just wanted to check on me. You’ve done that,” Deli says, closing the gap between them further.
Colin fights the urge to back away. “I wasn't even sure if you'd be here. I didn't—I didn't have a plan.”
“Well, uh, um, I do—” Deli starts patting his clothing and glancing about the room before pulling a yellowed envelope from under some war trophy on the mantelpiece. He holds it out to Colin who takes it cautiously.
“What, what is this?”
“I wrote it, uh, five years ago. It’s a letter.”
Colin has to think to place himself in the appropriate moment—five years ago, when he was with Raphaniel in Comida, and when Deli was orchestrating the unification of the Meatlands with Karna by his side. He carefully breaks the seal with the side of his thumb and discards the envelope in favor of the letter itself, equally yellowed.
He starts to read, noticing the word Sapphria, and his breath inadvertently catches in his throat. He remembers Sapphria, remembers the day he got word of her death, and remembers the resulting duel between Basha and the Speaker of the Hen, how the death of the foreign princess sealed the Meatlands’ involvement in the war.
“You, so you,” Colin starts, the letter shaking in his hand, “you had her killed? You killed the princess?”
Deli is staring a hole into the floor and his eyes look shinier than normal. “Yes.”
Colin runs his tongue over his teeth. A weak surge of anger rises in his stomach, and then settles back down into nothing like a wave dissolving into foam. Maybe it’s the time that’s passed. Maybe it's the grief and regret so clearly shown on Deli’s face. Maybe it’s that Colin is a far less idealistic man than he used to be, and maybe he doesn't want to lose yet another friend when he has felt so alone since they parted ways in Ceresia. He thinks of all the death of the war, all the blood he has spilled personally in service of his own ideals, and he finds it hard to summon his anger back. Gingerly, he folds the paper back up and puts it in his coat pocket.
“I didn't, I didn't understand war, uh, back then,” Colin begins, sighing. “I wasn't young but I was . . . I was stubborn, and I was naive.”
“You weren't wrong for being angry with me,” Deli mumbles.
“I never said I was wrong. I just don't know how much any of it matters anymore, after, after everything, after the war—”
“You don't need to forgive me, Colin. I can't expect that of you,” Deli blurts out. He’s not quite yelling, but the resonance of his voice fills the chamber completely.
“Bulb above, could you stop putting words in my mouth?” Colin snaps.
Deli freezes.
“Sorry. Sorry. I’m sorry. That was—I’m sorry. Please, just, let me talk.”
“I was going to say that I don't care. I wish I could say I did, and I don't know exactly what it means about me that I don’t, but there's no changing the past. Sapphria is dead, Pamela is dead, and so are thousands of other people. Including our friends. What I do care about is you,” Colin says, voice shaking. “I was so worried about you. For months. I didn't know if you died in a Meat Clan skirmish or ran off with someone and I wouldn't have been able to sleep at night if I didn't come look for you. I had to come look.”
“There was no one to run off with here,” Delissandro says simply.
“But you were going to run away by yourself?”
“To follow my mother, technically. It's a different thing.”
Colin rolls his eyes. “Yeah yeah, it's a Meat Lander thing and I wouldn't get it. It's not like I lived here for two years.”
“You barely learned anyone’s name.”
“That's not the point, and being social wasn't really in my duties either.”
“I’m not saying it was.”
Deli lets a smile creep into his voice. “We were attached at the hip. Do they say that in the Dairy Isles?”
Colin frowns. “Attached at the hip—no, no, in Lacra you say that you're part of the same wheel. In Vegetania they say you're two peas in a pod.”
That’s how Raphaniel described us, he thinks.
“Well. Regardless of how you put it, we spent every moment together.”
Colin’s memory flashes through scenes of blood red landscapes, war tents, eating charred meat off bone skewers as they surveyed rolling pork-hills. Always together, but bound by what, exactly? Obligation? Convenience? A promise made to Deli’s mother, sealed with gold coins?
“That was my job,” Colin offers. “To be with you.”
“It didn't feel like it was just your job.”
A new set of memories this time, strange glances thrown Colin’s way when Deli probably thought he wasn't paying attention. The odd burning in Colin’s chest when they subconsciously pressed together for warmth during cold nights, which he dismissed as Deli’s freakish body heat. The unfamiliar flicker of disquiet Colin felt when he first heard Karna addressed as skald.
“We became friends.”
“Yes. We were.”
“Well, if you want my forgiveness you already have it,” Colin says suddenly. “I don't think there is anything to forgive but if you need to hear it, then I forgive you. I already forgave you. I spent years angry. I don't want to be anymore.”
“I do, I do need to hear it,” Delissandro replies. “I’m shocked you even came here.”
“Yeah, well, after a war you can't be that picky. I don't have anyone left.”
“Amangeaux?” Deli asks.
Colin blinks in disbelief. “Deli, you know what I mean.”
“Assume I don't.”
“Amangeaux—yes, we still have her technically, she's not dead. But she's, she's not like you, to me. And she went off to do her own shit, she's working for the Emperor now and her son is a fuckin’ ward of the Empire who’s basically being raised as a prince. I know what she's up to. You dropped off the map,” Colin says pointedly.
“And you were so easily reached in all your wandering?”
“I thought you would need time. I had my own business and it kept me occupied till now.”
“All of this about what you thought I needed, Colin. It wounded me the same as any sword when you left without a word the day after the battle. I woke up to the Bulb in my face in Pangranos facing martial law and you were already gone. I needed you, not time.”
“Again, I am sorry for that,” Colin mutters. “You were in a bad place, with her death and Basha almost summoning a war council over your desertion. I was overwhelmed and I should have, I dunno. I should have stayed.”
Deli relaxes slightly and some of the tension in the room dissipates.
“There is not much we can do about it now. If we wanted to we could spend the rest of our lives thinking about the past and what we should have done. There are so many things I should have done, Colin, and so many things I wish I could take back.”
“Me too,” Colin says. He looks down at the floor, his worn, dirt-caked cheese-leather boots on the fine meat-marble clearly out of place. At least it’s dried mud on marble and not on boar skin carpet, he thinks.
“I’m sorry, I—I spent all this time imagining what it would be like to see you again and pictured exactly how it would go, exactly what I would say and now it's escaped me,” Deli says, pressing his lips together. “It's not going the way I planned. I fear you have done nothing but throw wrenches into my life.”
Colin holds back a chuckle. “Uh, whoops, I guess. My apologies. What did you picture instead, then?”
“I imagined a heated duel,” Deli laughs. “Back then when I wrote the letter I thought our next meeting would have been much the same, if you ever willingly entered my presence again.”
“I don't know if I would’ve,” Colin answers truthfully. “I can't, I can't imagine how, how I would feel, and I was with Raphaniel being his, his fuckin’ knight.”
“I thought I could accept whatever you chose to do, if you forgave me or abandoned me permanently.”
“What would you even have done if I forgave you? Kicked her out as skald? Had two?”
“I don't think I thought that far,” Deli says. “I expected the worst. I thought myself an irredeemable and prideful man.”
Colin collapses into a chair made of bones and tanned hide. “You know she loved you,” he says casually. He still doesn't want to use her name, almost as if the word itself would summon her presence.
Deli’s face twitches. Colin is temporarily stunned.
“Oh, you—”
“I mean. I knew. I didn't think about it,” he clarifies.
“Well, I saw how she looked at you before she died.”
Colin licks his bottom lip. “It was like she was accepting something, more than just her death. Almost like she was surrendering.”
“I always felt guilty about calling her skald after you left. It felt like a consolation prize, and I know there were times where she could sense it too. There—she knew, she knew she was taking your place only because you refused it. She didn't deserve to be a replacement,” Deli says tearfully. He wipes at his face with the back of his hand.
“It made me jealous,” Colin mumbles. He refuses to look up at Deli when he says it. “The first time I heard you say it to her I almost responded. It felt like being stabbed in the ribs.”
“Why would you be jealous of her, Colin?” Deli asks, like the premise is inherently ridiculous. “You chose to leave. She was a child the last you knew of her.”
“She was a woman when she died. And it would be easy to assume something more was happening.” Colin lets a little bitter edge creep into his tone.
“She was a loyal companion and I cared for her as a blood brother,” Deli says firmly. “And nothing of the sort happened between us. I loved her, yes, but not in the way she loved me, and I know it destroyed her.”
“As observant as we knew she was, I think she was even more knowledgeable than we give her credit for,” Colin sighs.
“What do you mean?”
“I think she knew exactly why she was your second choice.”
Deli says nothing and stares daggers into the floor. “Yes, I suppose that she never would have become skald if you hadn't left,” he says finally, “but you did. And so she became skald.”
Colin closes his eyes and exhales. He regrets coming to Carn and regrets all the strange feelings that seeing Deli again has brought back to the surface. He had convinced himself while he was lonely that it would be a relief to see an old friend. It was not proving to be true.
“Listen, do you want to go get a drink and catch me up, catch me up more, I mean,” he offers.
“Oh. Yes, I see no reason why not.”
“Great.”
Colin turns on his heels immediately and Deli follows, taking a far more leisurely pace.
They find a bar and are sat in a dark corner with a Ceresian ale and a Vegetanian spirit, respectively.
“I can't imagine it’s been easy these past years,” Colin says.
“It has not been, no.”
“I’m surprised you weren't banished.”
“It was certainly on the table at first. If Basha did not trust me as much as he did, if I was not so . . . instrumental in his rise to power, I believe that would have happened.”
Colin takes a long sip.
“Your politicking worked out for you, then?”
Deli grimaces. “We both know my politicking was a failure.”
“Not all of it.”
“I achieved my goals, yes, but at what cost. I united the Meatlands and escaped banishment or execution, but I murdered a princess and her mother all under their manipulation. I lost friends. I lost my mother,” Deli says somberly.
“That's politics for you, I guess. My family was destroyed because of them too,” Colin says. “I think in some alternate scenario you’re a very successful statesman, if it helps at all. Without, you know, without them, I think you would have gotten very far.”
Deli smiles. “In another life, I married Ariana and became a Ceresian senator, I’m sure of it. But that is not the world we live in. And in another life you would be ruling the Dairy Isles, no?”
Colin furrows his brow and shrugs. “I guess so. I don't ever think of it that way.”
“Prince Colin Provolone of the Dairy Isles.”
“I wouldn't go by Provolone in that situation. It’s my mother's name,” he explains.
“Prince Colin Fontina of the Dairy Isles,” Deli repeats. “I prefer Provolone.”
“Well, me too. And maybe keep your voice down, I know it's empty in here but I prefer to not to take that risk at all.”
“Apologies.”
Colin takes a measured sip of his drink.
“Have you just been in that room ever since Basha decided to spare you?” he asks.
Deli shakes his head. “Of course not. I’m something of an advisor, not in name, nothing official, but, uh, to tell the truth, I told him why I deserted. In private, of course, but he's the only one who knows, uh, in the government. He knows I’m not a traitor, but from an outside perspective it seems he is harboring a deserter for no reason other than his personal fondness. Becoming an Outlander is advantageous for both of us.”
“He believed you?”
“Well, he already trusted me, as I said. When certain key individuals were declared missing and eventually dead after the war, names that aligned with my story, he had no other choice but to know I was telling the truth.”
“The church has brushed over Camille's disappearance completely. They're calling it a ‘natural and private death’”, Colin says, with air quotes. “Bullshit.”
“I do my best to not keep up with the church,” Deli says distastefully.
“I find that shocking. Basha is a devout Bulbian. He is spreading the gospel of its light to the heathen Meatlands,” Colin deadpans.
“Political theater at its finest. Laying his hand upon the Book of Leaves when I can tell you personally he has never read a single passage.”
“You have to play to win. Saying you’re a Bulbian to comply with the Concord is part of the game,” Colin says. “Candia’s not fucking Bulbian either, Duke Jawbreaker is a Candian pagan and he’s next in line for the throne.”
“I see you’ve overcome your hatred of politics long enough to learn all this. It would seem we have reversed roles,” Deli says.
“Well, the rest of the Sanctus, to find them, I had to take a page out of our friend's book, to put it one way.”
“King Amethar was married to his sister’s widow to avoid the line of succession falling to the Duke, actually,” Colin adds. “In fact, I think they've already had children. Pushes Joren even further down.”
“His sister’s widow? I didn't realize one of the princesses had already wed.”
“Yeah, Lazuli—I say widow. I don't know if they were actually ever married. Betrothed, at least. The wife, the new queen, her name is Caramelinda, I think.”
Colin finishes his glass.
“I wish there was anything else to talk about,” Deli mutters under his breath. “It's so difficult to recall my life before the war. I feel as if I have lived more years than have actually passed.”
“You’re still young. I’m actually old.”
Deli shakes his head. “You look the same as when I last saw you.”
“I was old then too.”
“I turn thirty in a matter of weeks.”
“You were, what, still a teenager when we met?”
“Nineteen, yes.”
Colin groans and hides his face in his hands. “I’m gonna need another, you were a baby. I was twenty-fuckin’-seven.”
“Oh please, that's not old, you’re thirty-eight now and that’s not old either. Raphaniel was old,” Deli insists.
“I have to agree with that, but I don't know, I think, I always associated you with a better future, back then, when I was your skald or whatever. I thought that all heirs to the thrones of Comida should be like you.”
Deli flushes. “That's flattering and all, but my character back then was not enviable. I was a fool, Colin.”
“A fool for what? Being blackmailed? Falling for an older woman who was using you?”
“For believing that scheming and games of politics and interpersonal connection would validate me.”
“There's no use beating yourself up for it now.”
“Yes, well. The consequences have punished me more than enough.”
Colin stares at his empty glass and chews on his cheek. “I mean, you are half Ceresian. You have family there in House Carbano, so you could go back.”
Deli shakes his head. “I can't be noble again.”
“You’d be a minor lord at the most.”
“Please. I’ve made up my mind.”
“I’m being selfish, I know. It’s just that you're sort of, you’re all I have left,” Colin says, sighing. “I can't go back to Dairy. You know that. I never had family there anyway, and I can't really come visit you out in the middle of nowhere. I couldn't send a letter to a beef jerky hut and get a response.”
“I respect your honesty. I cannot say I don't understand the feeling.”
“I was being a dick when I left Pangranos. I’m trying to make it right now, but I get it. You have to do this for yourself. I can't expect you to stick around for my convenience when I haven't been there for you in years.”
“I’m afraid that’s true. I do wish things were different.”
Deli's tone isn't hostile, it’s resigned and gentle, but the words hit Colin like a fist in the stomach. He swallows hard.
“I should go,” he says abruptly, refusing to make eye contact. “I have, there are ships, leaving tonight.”
“Leaving for where?”
“Don't know. All kinds of places.”
“It’s late,” Deli offers, weakly.
“That doesn't really matter,” Colin mutters, standing up and throwing some coins down on the table.
He feels sick all of a sudden, probably not from the alcohol because he only had the one glass. Colin tries not to think about the actual cause and hopes the cool evening air will settle his stomach and relieve the burning flush in his cheeks, which he does attribute to his drink.
“Can I escort you?”
Colin pauses, flustered. “I guess,” he says, and walks out of the bar in a hurry.
“Did you really plan this as just a short stop?” Deli asks once he’s caught up.
“I don't plan anything, but sure. I didn't expect to stay more than a night or two.”
“So you have other business?”
“Yes,” Colin lies, and he feels a pang of guilt because Deli asked so earnestly.
“Oh. You should have said that.”
He sounds disappointed, Colin thinks.
“There's always something to do. I’m sure I have more members of the Sanctus to kill, somewhere.”
“Did it make you feel better?”
Colin keeps his gaze ahead of him on the cracked cobblestones. “No. But that's not why I was doing it.”
“My, my blackmail, it didn't really matter. I mean, on some level it did, but that was my whole life, blackmail. From the day I was born I was a mistake. A ticking time bomb,” Colin mutters.
“That first night I was apathetic. I thought, you know, anything to stay alive. Do what they want and get out like every job I’d ever done, but at the end of it all I wasn't relieved. I just felt worse. Even after Pangranos, I was numb.”
“I set out to destroy the Sanctus because otherwise the cycle would repeat, they’d gain power again and exploit some other unfortunate ragtag group and ruin their lives too. It was never cathartic. Murder is not really the path toward healing, but like you said, I was running from how I felt.”
Colin exhales and keeps talking. “Then imagine me, four years later, blood on my hands, deep in the fuckin’ Ceresian countryside burning these bodies, and it finally hits me, Deli. I start to grieve, I cry over Karna and even Raphaniel, I travel to Comida again to confirm that Amangeaux is alive and working for Uvano, and it takes me almost an entire year to find out that you're not dead.”
“Colin, I—”
“Don't apologize again.”
Colin stops at the edge of the docks where the stone transitions to rough splintered wood held together by rusted nails. The river is calm and still. The only sound is the soft splash of waves against the poles of the dock.
“My point is, I didn't come here thinking it was permanent. I wasn't trying to imply that, I came just to see you and get closure, I guess. That’s all I needed. Based on that letter, it seems like you needed it too.”
Colin doesn't say that he would have gladly stayed if Delissandro asked because being completely truthful right now would only make it messier. He glances up to see Deli’s jaw clenched with tear trails down his cheeks.
“Yes,” Deli manages to say. “I know that I still, I have not grieved completely for what the war has taken from me, and I, I need to let go. I have to leave this place.”
Colin nods silently and stares at the dark, inky horizon where it meets the bloody waters of the Vein.
“I’m gonna, uh.”
“I know.”
“You can handle yourself,” Colin says after a moment. He knows it’s true, Deli is one of the greatest warriors he's met, and his survival skills are well-honed, but he feels a need to convince himself by actually saying it aloud.
Deli laughs. “Yes, Colin, that is the least of my worries.”
“You don't need a skald anymore,” he says under his breath.
“It wouldn't be a skald. I’m not a thane—”
“Okay, yes, that's not relevant.”
“I know what you mean. Our time in each other’s lives is over.”
“That’s a good way to put it, I think.”
Deli claps a hand on Colin’s shoulder and rests it there for a moment too long. The warmth and the weight are comforting, and it reminds Colin of how long it's been since he’s felt touch that wasn't a threat. He doesn't want to look at Delissandro’s tear-dampened face again, so Colin turns to the expanse of the docks, paying attention instead to the boats swaying, the tallow lamps glowing, the men preparing ships for departure and unloading cargo.
Slowly, Deli withdraws his hand. “Goodbye, Colin. I wish you all the best,” he says softly.
“Goodbye, Deli,” Colin says, trying to conceal the shakiness of his voice. “You too. Stay safe.”
He allows himself to glance back and Deli is smiling, mouth closed, eyes gleaming. Colin forces his body to take a stiff, heavy step forward, and then another across the slick wood of the dock. He doesn't look back again.
“Hey,” he says to no one in particular, letting a Lacran twang come through.
A sailor with shiny, waxy orange skin looks up from behind a stack of crates. “Aye, you need something?” he asks with an even thicker Dairy accent.
“Yeah, uh, you know of any ships leaving tonight? Early tomorrow, maybe?”
“Sure, any place in particular you need to go?”
“Fructera.”
He doesn't need to go to Fructera, but he knows saying “anywhere but the Dairy Isles” gets odd looks.
“Down that way and to your left, they're leaving as soon as the Bulb rises for Comida. If you need to get to another city I can't help you.”
Colin assures the man that Comida is just fine. He boards the ship as the sky starts to lighten, and the crew emerge and greet him, take down his name, and accept some coins.
He stays on deck, watching the Bulb appear beyond the horizon. He thinks of Deli, rising in Carn for the last time, and preparing to head for the Outlands. The light warms his face. It warms Delissandro's too.
“Goodbye, old friend,” Colin says to the Bulb, and turns away from the dawn.